IS CANOLA OIL POISONING YOUR BODY OR HELPING YOUR HEART? There is a controversy over the usage of this oil for cooking and baking.

If olive oil comes from olives, and sesame oil from sesame seeds, does canola oil come from canolas?

No, there's no such thing as a canola. It's a made up word that appeared out of nowhere and is not found in any references until about 1970. It's an abbreviation of "Canadian Oil Low Acid"--CAN-O-L-A. The modern canola oil, as we know it, is a product of traditional plant breeding technology, genetic engineering (seeds exposed to radiation to change their genetic make-up, and clever marketing.

The flip side of the canola coin reads: "rape". Canola oil is produced from the "rape seed" plant, part of the mustard seed family of plants. You must admit that canola oil sounds better than rape oil.

Rape seed is the most toxic of all food-oil plants. Insects will not eat it at all and only a few birds will, though it is thought to shorten their lives because it is deadly poisonous.

There is one kind of Canola Oil that is a semi-drying oil that is used as a lubricant, fuel, soap and synthetic rubber base and as an illuminant for the slick color pages you see in magazines. Some say it's an industrial oil and does not belong in the body!

This form of Canola oil has some very interesting characteristics and effects on living systems--it has been tested on rats and mice for several years with worrisome results, but never on humans. Well, I don't think a test that only lasted for a 3 week duration can really count, do you? For example, it forms latex-like (plastic?) substances that cause the red blood corpuscles to clump. Loss of vision is a known side effect of rape oil which slowly attacks the central and peripheral nervous systems. The deterioration takes years, some reports have put it at 10 to 20 years of use of the product. Rapeseed oil (canola) causes emphysema, respiratory distress, anemia, constipation, irritability and blindness in animals and possibly (?)---humans.

In the late 1960s, plant biologists created canola by crossing four varieties of rapeseed to reduce the levels of erucic acid (which makes oils go rancid quickly) and glucosinolate (which tastes bitter). The oil pressed from this new seed had a lower level of saturated fat, and a higher level of "good" fat, than other similar neutral-tasting oils like safflower, sunflower and grapeseed.

Scientists and growers in Canada (which produces the majority of canola worldwide, though the US, Australia and Europe also contribute) felt that a slight alteration would create a more viable crop. Seeds were put through natural plant breeding methods that have been used for thousands of years to change their genetic makeup and a new form of rapeseed plant was born. The Canola Plant. There is no evidence that any form of irradiation was used to make a GM (genetical mutated) seed at that time or later.

However, there are now different varieties of canola, such as Roundup Ready Canola, that have been genetically modified to make them more tolerant to specific herbicides or insecticides.

Oil from GM canola has been approved for food use in Australia only at this time. All Canola Oils for use by humans in the USA and Canada are NOT GM produced from GM plants.

If you have concerns about genetically modified food you should check with that food manufacturer to find out to your satisfaction if that oil (or food) was sourced from non-genetically modified crops.

Both food agencies of the Canadian and US governments approve the use of canola oil and have found it safe to use. Other governments, including those of Japan and Australia, also approve. There has been no proof to date that canola oil is harmful to humans.

Rape oil was widely used in animal feeds in England and Europe between 1986 and 1991 until it was completely banned by the British and other European governments. Remember reading about the cows, pigs and sheep that went blind, lost their minds, attacked people and had to be shot?

Experts blamed the erratic behavior on a viral disease called "scrapie". However, when rapeseed oil was removed from animal feed, this "scrapie" disappeared. It's later been proven that rapeseed had nothing to do with the disease.

U.S. farmers grow rape seed, and food manufacturers use its refined oil (canola) in thousands of processed foods. Could the same thing happen in the USA? Not likely! Government agency watchdogs keep a close eye on the growth and manufacture of items using any part of the Canola plant as well as the raising and feeding of livestock for consumpation.

Rapeseed meal, not the processed oil, has been used as animal fodder for a long time and still is in England and Europe. It has not been banned there but is not used in the USA. Also, the facts behind the claims about the rise and fall of Mad Cow disease are not borne out by any scientific facts.

Most scientists concur that Mad Cow disease developed when the animals were fed sheep offal that was contaminated with a virus-like disease known as "scrapie".

There is absolutely NO known link between the sheep "scrapie" disease and canola oil or canola plant usage. The only known link to Mad Cow disease is through livestock feed that's been contaminated with the sheep offal.

A popular article decrying the hazardous results of canola oil states:
"Studies with lab animals were disastrous. Rats developed fatty degeneration of heart, kidney, adrenals, and thyroid gland. When canola oil was withdrawn from their diets, the deposits dissolved but scar tissue remained on all vital organs."

This was an experiment with disastrous results. Why? Because the natural diet of a rat is made up of grains, raw fruits and vegetables and is very low in fatty acids. Introduce a load of heavier fats into a rat's diet and all sorts of health problems will develope-- for the rats!

Later studies demonstrated that cooking oils other than canola (specifically, sunflower seed oil) produced the same results in laboratory rats, as well as demonstrated that the digestive system of a rat is different from that of a human. There has been no reliable evidence found that Canola Oil is harmful to humans.

Does a link exist between the rapeseed plant and the mustard gas used in World War I or even Agent Orange from the Vietnam War? Try as hard as you might, nothing scientific can be found.

The rapeseed does belong to the mustard family but so does turnips, cabbages, watercress, horseradish, Brussel Sprouts and radishes which are all perfectly safe to eat. It's just the seeds of the rapeseed plant that must be processed before consumption.

Mustard gas, a volatile, toxic chemical used in the trenches in WW1, is called 'mustard' gas only because it has a mustard-like odor. There's no other connection with canola or the rapeseed plant! It's like they are cousins on the same family tree, only 30 or 40 removed.

Nerve gases (such as sarin, as in Agent Orange) inhibit acetylcholinesterase (say that three times, fast!). In a nutshell, acetylcholinesterase is a chemical that inhibits certain enzymes from breaking down the acetylcholine compound which is a neurotransmitter for the nervous system in the human body. There is none of this in the Canola plant. Maybe this myth has come about from a wild association with mustard seeds and by association, the rapeseed plant. There's absolutely NO evidence to support it's use in either product.

There is some legitimate controversy, however.

More than 60% of the canola crop in Canada (where most of world crop is grown) comes from genetically modified (GM) seeds. This is plant seeds that have been exposed to radiation to change their genetic or DNA make-up.

Genetic seeds are illegal in Europe and opposed by activists throughout the world because, even with our current technology, there is no way to ensure that genetically modified organisms will remain under control. The use of this technology outside secure laboratory environments carries potentially unacceptable risks to both farmed and wild ecosystems as well as the animal life associated with it.

An example of this is a current strain of the canola seed from a company that produces herbicide sprays. That strain is now immune to all herbicide spray and is continuing to grow in the fields and changing. The company predicts the plant to have a life expectancy of 10 years of re-growth and are worried about possible cross-breeding in the field that may produce an even more resistant strain to herbicides.

The plants grown in the USA for Canola Oil are not GM seeds as per the guidelines by our Food and Drug Administration.

So, after weighing everything, I don't think there's any evidence to suggest that you should stop using Canola Oil.

Nutritionally, it's an excellent source of omega-3 fatty acids, and has been shown in many clinical trials to lower LDL cholesterol levels (the type associated with coronary heart disease), and total cholesterol. It's a safe and nutritionally sound choice for cooking but, as with any fat, use it in moderation.

Canola oil is by all accounts, a heart healthy oil that you shouldn't be afraid of because of some Internet scare based on half truths that have been bent and twisted out of shape to satisfy someone's personal agenda, whatever that may be.

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